


not ever too late

by kirani



Series: Hogwarts, Please! [4]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Anxiety Attacks, Asexual Character, Crushes, Flashbacks, Friends to Lovers, Love Confessions, M/M, Mentions of Kesha, Mutual Pining, POV Alternating, Quidditch, Slow Burn, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:28:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22101811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirani/pseuds/kirani
Summary: Adam Birkholtz and Justin Oluransi are best friends, even though they're in different houses - and on different quidditch teams - at Hogwarts. Adam is a chaser on the Hufflepuff team and Justin is keeper and captain of Gryffindor. Their seventh year, the rivalry is real but the friendship is stronger. And if Adam maybe has been in love with Justin since fifth year and if maybe Justin has been in love with Adam since before that? Well, they've kept the secret this long...
Relationships: Adam "Holster" Birkholtz/Justin "Ransom" Oluransi
Series: Hogwarts, Please! [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1266653
Comments: 14
Kudos: 79
Collections: OMGCP AU Bang 2019





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There's a lot of notes, hang with me. 
> 
> First, a million thanks to my beta [lobsterdex](https://lobsterdex.tumblr.com/), thank you to Laney for the lend of several OCs when I ran out of canon characters to fill out this many quidditch teams, and a huge thank you to the mods of the AU Big Bang for putting on this awesome event! 
> 
> This is a standalone work in my Hogwarts!AU, you don't have to read the nurseydex prequel in the series to follow, though of course I would love if you did! For those who haven't read it, Dex goes by Liam in this universe. Everything else should be self-explanatory!
> 
> [Amazing art for this fic](https://tangotangredi.tumblr.com/post/190069508559/not-ever-too-late-by-willdexpoindexter-as-part) by Sav!
> 
> Title is from the song Futures by Darlingside

**Adam**

This was their year. Adam could feel it in his bones. They had the best pair of beaters in the school, their keeper had professional level skill, their seeker was the fastest thing he’d ever seen on a broom, and their chaser crew was unstoppable. He was biased in that last one since he was one of them, but the point stood. This was their year. 

Settled on the couch in the Hufflepuff common room with his team, Adam felt a surge of pride. This team had been together since the start of his fifth year, but back then, when Cait, Liam, and Derek had first joined, they were young and didn’t have the experience they needed. Now? 

Liam and Derek had grown into tall, strong beaters and best friends. 

Cait had figured out her place in the chaser sequences and neatly filled the gap between Adam’s aggressive play and Larissa’s speedy flying. 

Eric had developed as a seeker, too; he had the speed naturally, but he had honed his flying skill until he was literally flying circles around the other seekers. And even though the boy couldn’t concentrate on school work to save his life, his focus on the quidditch pitch was almost eerie. 

Lastly, Chris Chow was a force to be reckoned with at the goalposts. He had made the team his second year, blowing the competition out of the water despite his small size at thirteen. His summer growth spurt meant that not only did he have the intimidating glare and lightning-fast reflexes of years past, he now had the reach to get the quaffles he would have missed before. 

It was their fucking year. 

He decided he needed to tell his team this. “You guys.” 

They looked up at him. 

“This is our fucking year.”

Around him, all his teammates smiled, rolled their eyes, and fist-bumped him accordingly. 

As captain, it should really be Larissa giving the rousing speeches, but they’d been on the team together since their third year and were the oldest members so Adam liked to help out with morale where he could. He nodded at her encouragingly and she smirked back before speaking as well.

“I think it is,” she agreed. “We’re the best team in this school. We’ve got chemistry that makes angels weep and skills that make pros jealous. We’re prettier than them, we’re faster than them, and we fucking worked harder for it than them!”

“That’s right!” Adam crowed. Somewhere else in the common room, someone yelled at him to shut up. “Okay but, food? I’m starved.”

The team laughed and chirped him lightly as they all packed up their bags and made their way down to the Great Hall. On the way, he ran into his best friend Justin Oluransi and swung his arm around his shoulders, pulling him into the group. 

“Fraternizing with the enemy!” Cait chirped with a grin. 

Justin ducked his head like he always did when their teams poked fun at their friendship. They were close, what could he say? 

Justin was the Gryffindor keeper, and his team had accepted Adam just as easily as the Hufflepuff team had accepted Justin. They were a package deal. Best bros to the end. Friends forever.

Okay, so it was a little more than ‘friendship’ on Adam’s side. Sometime in his fifth year, he had realized that he was crushing pretty hard on his best friend. He had figured out he was bisexual in the fourth year when one of Justin’s teammates had come back from summer holiday tanned and with a new haircut and Adam’s first reaction had been to lock himself in his dorm and refuse to come out. Not exactly straight behaviour. 

But it wasn’t until he and Justin had been teasing each other about the upcoming Hufflepuff Gryffindor match in fifth year, rough-housing and chirping as always, that Adam had realized that he cared about Justin in more than a platonic way. He’d told Derek and Liam about the crush in a fit of bravery but quickly retreated back into his usual shell of platonic bro-hood. Derek had encouraged him to go for it, but Adam had brushed him off. Ever since then, he’d desperately tried to hide his love for his best friend. 

“I hear there’s plum pudding at dinner,” Justin noted as they moved down the hallway. 

“Ugh, Justin why do you like that stuff so much?” Justin’s weird tastes were often a source of chirping between them, especially his love of dried fruit in everything. 

“Hey, it’s good!” 

“Sure, bro, whatever you say.”

Justin reached around and poked Adam’s side, right at his most ticklish spot, causing him to pull back in mock outrage and try to wrestle him into a headlock. 

“Oy!” Liam called. “Not in the halls. You’ll bulldoze a first year!” 

“You’re no fun, Poindexter,” Derek chirped, looping his own arm around his beater partner’s shoulders. 

Liam rolled his eyes as his cheeks heated. Adam smiled at the display. “Aren’t they cute, Justin?” he whispered. 

“So cute,” Justin replied. Adam couldn’t believe the two hadn’t gotten together yet, they’d been flirting basically non-stop since they both made the team two years ago, but so far nothing had happened. At least not that they were sharing. Justin was convinced they were secretly dating and had been since third year but Adam had yet to see any proof. 

Finally, they made it to the Great Hall and Justin tugged Adam over to the Gryffindor table. He waved a lazy goodbye to his teammates and followed easily. They settled in between Shruti and River, two of the Gryffindor chasers, and Justin immediately reached for the pudding. Adam smacked his hand. 

“Bro!” 

Adam raised an eyebrow at him and Justin caved, reaching instead for the stew and bread and serving himself a large helping with exaggerated flair. 

“Drama queen,” Shruti chirped. Justin stuck his tongue out at her. Adam grinned. 

They chatted easily over dinner, exchanging details of the first week of classes. Adam and Justin took both of their electives together third year, but after OWLS Justin had dropped Divination and now only took Arithmancy while Adam had dropped both. That, combined with only sharing a few of their core classes with each other’s houses, meant that they had a lot of details to exchange. 

Shruti was in her sixth year and her fifth year with the team. The girl was a menace on the pitch and while Adam loved watching her obliterate other teams, he hated going up against her. His sixth year he had shot up to six foot and gladly used it to intimidate on the pitch. Shruti was not to be cowed. He respected that. 

River had made the team only last year but fit into the lineup with ease. As a quiet third year, he had raised a curious eyebrow at some of the team’s traditions but had slipped into the group seamlessly. Now in his third year, Adam thought he was gonna blow them all out of the water in terms of skill by the end of the year. 

The team had a gap on their roster for beaters and Adam was worried on Justin’s behalf that they’d never fill March and April’s shoes. The two of them had been an unbeatable force on the pitch and they loved to play with the fact that a lot of players underestimated them as girls. They hit those people the hardest. Adam shivered at the memory. He wouldn’t miss that. 

“You cold, Holtzy?”Justin wrapped an arm around Adam’s shoulders, pulling him back to the present. Adam smiled at him and let himself lean into the touch. Justin’s constant nicknaming of him was going to be the death of him. It had started out as “Holtz”, just a shortened version of his last name, but soon he had added the ‘y’ and it had become alarmingly cute. 

“Nah, I’m good, just remembering March and April pelting me with bludgers.”

“Aww, B! Were you afraid of March and April?” There he went with the nicknames again. 

“Shut up, no,” Adam blushed and changed the subject to stop the stream of nicknames. “When are you guys doing tryouts?”

Justin groaned. “Don’t remind me. It seems like half the house signed up for tryouts and I only have the two beater spots and Kent’s chaser spot. It’s gonna be a disaster.”

“Gryffindors.” Adam nodded knowingly. Shruti threw a pea at him. 

~

**Justin**

Back in second year when he and Adam had first started messing around on the quidditch pitch, he had donned the keeper helmet to help Adam practice his goal shots. Adam had a good arm on him but it turned out Justin had been a natural in the goal. 

“You should try out for the Gryffindor team, Justin,” Adam had suggested one evening in the library. “You’re really good.”

Justin shrugged. He liked playing Quidditch. But did he really want to play against his best friend? 

“What?” Adam pressed. 

“If we were in the same house, I would be there in an instant, bro.” Back then, he still stuck with ‘bro’ or ‘Adam’ when talking to his best friend. “But I don’t know if I can play against you, you know?”

“Oh,” Adam blushed. And that was the thing about Adam, even back in second year, he was unbearably cute. Justin was still trying to come to terms with how endearingly cute his best friend was back then. “You saying you wanna be a Hufflepuff, Oluransi?” He chirped, back on friendly footing though his blush was still blazing. 

“You wish, Birkholtz!” Justin tackled him and the pair dissolved in giggles as Madam Pinch glared at them. “Shh!” He pressed his finger to Adam’s lips and the other boy licked it. “Gross!” 

“But really,” Adam continued after they had stopped giggling into their robe collars. “You would totally make the team. I know they have a keeper opening because that weird Johnson kid is dropping out. I promise not to go easy on you if you don’t on me.”

“Like I’m the one we need to worry about here, Holtz. You’re so good. I just try to keep up.”

“No way!”

“Mr Birkholtz!” Madam Pinch called out. Adam ducked his head. 

“No way,” he whispered. “You’re awesome and they’d be lucky to have you.”

“I’ll think about it,” Justin conceded. 

He had never thought that conversation would land him here, in his seventh year at Hogwarts and captain of the team. He was nervous about measuring up in Kent’s shadow, but Adam had faith in him and that’s really what mattered. 

Because all through school, Adam Birkholtz has been his best friend, his support, his number one fan — unless they were going head to head on the quidditch pitch — and really just his “person” in every way. The idea that they were going to be going out into the world and not living in the same room anymore scared the shit out of Justin. 

But he didn’t have time to worry about all that right now. He had quidditch tryouts to run. 

He had tapped Shruti as the second oldest student on the team to help run the tryouts and it looked like he was going to need it. Before him stood at least 20 Gryffindors holding various brooms and wearing various bits and pieces of gear. 

“Listen up!” He called and the assembled housemates fell to a nervous silence. “If you’re here for the beater positions, please move this way,” he gestured to his right. “And if you’re here for the chaser position, to this side,” he finished, sweeping his arm the other way. 

The split went in a weird direction, the chaser group nearly twice the size of the beaters group for half the openings. Justin sighed. 

“You want chasers or beaters?” He asked Shruti. She was a chaser herself so he thought he knew but with that big of a group she might go for the beaters. 

“Beaters. You should be keeping for the chasers anyway.” 

Justin nodded and crossed to the chaser group. A dozen faces looked up at him. A couple were clearly second years taking advantage of being allowed to try out at all. He recognized a sixth year Shruti was close with, and everyone else was just kinda vaguely familiar middle grades. 

“Right, I’m going to lead you all through some passing exercises in small groups to see how you fly and handle the quaffle. Then we’re going to do shots on goal. Does everyone have a broom?” A pair of second years raised their hands tentatively and he sent them to the broom shed to borrow school brooms. 

Soon enough all thirteen of them were in the air in groups of four or five and passing the practice quarrels in a circle. Justin wove between and under them, looking at their form. After a few minutes, he blew his whistle and the groups paused in their passes, one of the quarrels dropping to the ground. Justin gestured at it and one of the group flew down to grab it. He was glad he had only had them fly ten feet in the air instead of at the full pitch height. 

“This time we’re going to fly in formation just like you just were and pass the quaffle as you go. This group first,” he gestured to the group of five second and third years. They flew shakily across the pitch passing the quaffle between them and dropping it several times on passes. “And back!” He called and the group turned and returned down the pitch. None of them stood out as anything spectacular and Justin noted down a few who seemed more competent. 

The next group had more promise, the blond fourth year passing expertly and even snagging a bad pass with a smooth dip. Justin made a note on the sheet beside his practice robe number. Matt Johansen. Good to know. 

When the last group had gone as well, he donned his keeper’s helmet and took his place at the goalposts. Each hopeful teammate began at half-pitch and approached the goal, shooting on him. A few made good shots that would have gotten past a less skilled keeper and could improve with practice. Several threw it straight into his arms. Matt Johansen scored on him. 

“Nice shot, Johansen!” he called before he went back to the back of the line. They went through the round three times and Matt scored on him once more and the sixth year girl scored on him once. A fifth-year boy got close the third round and while Justin could definitely see the potential, the top player was clear. 

He landed on the pitch beside Shruti and pulled out his notes. 

“How’d they do?”

“I have a favourite pair for sure. Hugo Finn, number 18,” she paused as Justin looked at the huddle of beaters and picked out the practice robes. “And Harris Browning, number 7.” Justin found the other boy, too. The remaining beater candidates were a pair of truly tiny second years who looked like they’d be knocked over with a breath of wind, a sixth-year girl, and a fifth-year boy. 

“Third years?” he guessed. 

“Finn is fourth, Browning is third,” Shruti confirmed. “They need a lot of training but they’ve got a good eye for strategy and are confident on a broom. We can work with it. Woodworth and Boucher could be knocked over with a strong wind and they seem to be afraid of the bludger. DeSilvia and Macnamara are decent but neither of them connected with any of the other kids so I couldn’t get a feel for their style of play.”

“Okay, and Browning and Finn have good chemistry?”

“I think they’ve got the makings of a good partnership. You wanna see them play?”

“Yeah, let’s do a joint thing. You and River wanna run some drills with my top few? And I can send the beaters in pairs to interrupt, get a feel for them, too.” He handed her his notes with his top four starred. 

“Cool,” Shruti nodded and waved River down from the stands, crossing to the loose group of chaser hopefuls and calling off the four names as Justin crossed over to the beaters. 

“We’re gonna run in pairs to disrupt the chaser drills so I can get a feel for you as well and we can see how you actually play. Finn, Browning, you two first.” The two boys mounted and took to the air, hefting their bats. He watched them talk briefly to each other, then split up, taking ready stances. On the other side of the pitch, River, Shruti, and Matt took to the air in a V formation and began advancing down the pitch towards the empty goal posts. 

From the ground, Justin released the bludger. 

The two boys converged on the ball and Finn got there first, swinging hard in a smooth motion. Yeah, Justin could see it. He was smooth on the broom. 

Shruti expertly dodged the shot and Browning snagged it from the other side, sending it back at the V of chasers, this time at River. The trio sank the quaffle into the centre goal post and Justin called the bludger down. 

He sent up the second year pair next but they made weak contact and shied away from the bludger. Again, Shruti had made a good assessment. 

He tried a few combinations of pairs of the middle-grade students, leaving the two second years on the ground. He could tell they knew they hadn’t done well and made a note to let them know he was glad they had come out and to keep practising. 

After a few rotations, Justin was sure that Shruti had the right idea and that Finn and Browning were the best pair. They still needed some practice but he could see the makings of a good beater pair. He dismissed everyone and reconvened with Shruti and River. The consensus there was Matt, so the three of them packed up the gear and stowed it away, pleased with the results of the tryouts. 

The new team was going to have some growing pains, for sure, but losing three of their best players to graduation was rough on any house team. At least they still had Georgia in Seeker. He did not envy Shruti trying to replace her next year. 

As the three of them made their way back up to the castle, Justin’s mind wandered to the chirping Adam would give him when they played his team in October. Even with a decent pair of beaters and a nice chaser line, they were just no match for the seamless chemistry of the Hufflepuff team. 

He was still looking forward to the game, though. Any chance to see that concentration bearing down on him was a good one. 

~

**Adam**

Quidditch practices that fall were wet. It seemed to be always raining, the ground muddy when they landed and the brooms slippery in their grasps. Nevertheless, Adam refused to let his good mood be altered. He shouted encouragement to his teammates and slapped them all heartily on the backs after a hard-won practice. 

Despite the weather, the team really was on point. They had even come up with a few new plays to help them in their quest to finally win the Quidditch Cup. Hufflepuff hadn’t won it in over a decade, and the entire team was fighting for it. 

Their first game would be against Gryffindor and Adam had enjoyed teasing Justin about mopping the floor with the Gryffindor team for a bit until Justin cut him off. 

“Look, B, I know your team is awesome and I don’t mind a little chirping but I’m trying really hard as captain for the first time and you’re really bumming me out. This isn’t fun chirping.”

“Oh shit, Justin I’m so sorry!” 

Justin shook his head and tried to brush it off with a shrug but Adam wrapped him in a hug and squeezed tight. “You’re an amazing captain and your team is gonna be amazing before you know it. You’ve just got some growing pains. But you’re gonna grow! Because you are just that good of a captain.”

“Thanks, Holtzy. Even if you’re gonna slaughter us next week.”

“Eh, you win some and you lose some.” Adam smiled and Justin smiled back. 

“You’re gonna win them all this year. I can feel it.” 

Adam felt his cheeks heat at the compliment. Justin really was too good for him. 

As the match got closer, Adam spent a lot of time thinking about his breakdown before the Gryffindor game in fifth year, when he had finally realized he’d been in love with Justin for a while now. 

He had met up with Justin after practice that day to work on homework together in the Gryffindor common room. Lardo had driven them hard, trying to get them in shape for the game and he had collapsed onto the red couch with a heavy sigh. 

“You okay, Holtz?” 

“Practice. Dead.”

“No dying, man, you’re my best friend,” Justin nudged him over on the couch.

“Aww, you’re my best friend, too. But it’s too late. I’m already dead.”

“C’mere,” Justin nudged him again, twisting his shoulders away from the back of the couch. As soon as they were free, Justin slid his hands onto them and began to massage out the tension. Adam closed his eyes and enjoyed the feeling. 

“Where the hell did you learn how to do this?” Adam groaned as Justin found a particularly tight knot and began to work it out. 

“My mom taught me,” Justin explained. “Said she needed someone to rub her shoulders after a full day of dealing with the insanity of the ministry when Dad was still in the City. All us kids know how to do a good shoulder rub.”

Adam nodded as he sank further into the cushions and Justin’s hands. His dad was a muggle who worked in the London financial district and Adam had heard plenty of stories about his long hours and working through vacations with Justin’s mom and sisters. 

“Alright, I think you’re good, B.” He patted Adam’s shoulders perfunctorily. “You ready to rock this Divination essay?”

“Ugh, yeah, alright.” He settled into the couch and pulled out his partially finished essay. He did feel better after the back rub, at least. As they worked, the feeling of Justin’s hands on his skin lingered and Adam found himself pausing mid-word to stare into space at the memory of the sensation. He could tell that Justin thought something was wrong because he kept stealing glances at him. Adam tried to smile back but got caught up on the sudden flurry of butterflies in his stomach looking at his best friend. 

He’d never thought of Justin as anything besides his best bro, but suddenly he couldn’t stop thinking about his touch. 

They touched all the time! This shouldn’t be a big deal! The two of them rough-housed, swung arms over each other’s shoulders, poked and tickled, and hugged each other. He’d never fixated on a touch before. Was it because it was a massage? It did seem more intimate than most of their touches, but at the same time, he’d literally napped in the same bed as Justin before, this wasn’t a new level of intimacy. 

He shook his head of the thoughts again and tried to focus on his essay, but Justin was looking at him with his eyebrows furrowed. 

“Are you alright?” 

“I’m fine,” Adam said too quickly to be natural. 

“You don’t seem fine,” Justin continued, reaching out to put a hand on Adam’s forearm and stop his frenzied writing. “Do you need to lay down for a bit? You can sleep in my bed, I’ll wake you up for dinner.”

Adam shut his eyes to the concern on his best friend’s face. His best friend! He had to get ahold of himself. The skin on his arm where Justin held it burned. 

“You know, I think I am gonna go lay down. In my own bed though. I have a headache,” he finished weakly. Justin only looked more worried.

“Let me walk you back at least, you really don’t look good.”

Adam took stock of himself and felt his knees shaking and his cheeks hot with a blush. The back of his neck felt clammy and he was almost certainly blinking too much. He stood up anyway, shoving the parchment into his bag and not caring if the ink smudged. It was probably all garbage anyway; he hadn’t been paying attention to what he was doing. 

Justin walked him back down to the Hufflepuff dormitory and Adam tried to keep up a decent conversation but knew he fell short. He just kept thinking about the heat of Justin’s hands. He couldn’t help himself. All he wanted was a reason to have them back on him somehow. It wasn’t sexual, per se, he didn’t think. It was more than that. He wanted Justin’s hands on him because they were Justin’s. He wanted that easy intimacy. He wanted that kind of… 

Somewhere along the way, he’d fallen for his best friend. 

Justin hugged him tightly at the door to the dormitory after Adam insisted he was alright to go inside by himself and promised to check in on him later. Adam nodded numbly and tapped out the code to open the door. 

The Hufflepuff common room was softly lit and filled with the soft sounds of students working on homework and talking to each other. Adam stumbled a little as he crossed to an empty table and sank into a chair. He looked up when Derek tapped on the table. Was he there before? 

“Hey Birkholtz, you alright, man?”

Adam shook his head and looked down at the table instead of up at his teammate. “I’ve been thinking. About Gryffindor.” That was safe. He was reeling from the tough practice and the stress of the upcoming game against his best friend. 

“The game?” Liam asked. “I think we’ve got a really good shot.”

Adam didn’t look up, just shook his head again in a fit of bravery as he trailed his fingers across the wood of the table. “Not about the game. Well, kind of? I don’t know. About the team. About Justin.” He was rambling but if he didn’t say something he thought his heart my explode out of his chest. 

“Oh,” Derek said. Adam looked up at him for a moment and could tell immediately that the younger boy knew what he meant. “What about Justin?” Derek prompted when Adam didn’t continue.

“We’ve been friends for years, you know?” Adam began, trying to figure out how much he wanted to say. “But I can’t stop thinking about him. And I think…” 

He looked up at the two boys. Derek’s face was open and encouraging; Liam’s was confused.

“You can tell us anything, man, we’ve got your back,” Derek insisted. 

Adam knew he was telling the truth but getting the words out seemed impossible suddenly. If he said it aloud it was real. He steeled himself and whispered the words: “I think I like him. I think I have for a while.”

It was out. He had admitted it. He was screwed. There was no way Justin liked him like that. Why did he have to go and fuck up a perfectly good best friendship with romantic feelings?

Derek smiled at him, unaware of the turmoil swirling in Adam’s chest. “That’s chill. Might be weird to ask him outright before the Hufflepuff Gryffindor game though,” he chirped with a wink.

A laugh startled out of his chest and he shook his head again, dropping his eyes back to the table. “I don’t think I’m going to.”

“Yeah, better to wait.”

“No, I mean,” Adam took a deep breath. “I mean I don’t think I’ll ever ask him out.”

“What? Why not?” Derek asked.

“Bro,” he looked up again. “He’s so far out of my league.” That was one way to put it, certainly. Even if most of his concern was focused on the fear of ruining their friendship.

“Not true.” Derek insisted. “You’re Adam Birkholtz! You’re smart and funny and kind. He’d be lucky to have you.”

“I dunno.”

“You don’t have to decide right now. Think about it. But don’t let him beat us on Saturday just because you’re crushing, yeah?” he chirped. 

Adam tried to laugh but it sounded choked when it left his lips. Liam hadn’t said anything in a while and Adam snuck a look at him. He was staring unfocused ahead of himself and suddenly he turned and nearly ran to the dormitory door. 

“Is he okay?”

Derek looked after his friend with a furrowed brow before turning back to Adam. “I’ll go check on him in a minute. But just, promise me you’ll think about it, alright? You’re a cool dude and I think you’ve got a shot.”

“Yeah, I’ll think about it. Go check on Liam. I think I broke him with my emotions,” Adam said, slipping back into his defensive sarcasm. 

Derek laid a hand briefly on Adam’s bicep then turned and followed Liam up the dormitory stairs. Adam watched the doorway blankly and hoped Liam was alright. Derek would take care of him. Those two were becoming as close as he and Justin were. 

Justin. 

Adam pillowed his head on his arms and closed his eyes against the onslaught of emotions in that name. He had no idea when he had fallen so far down this particular emotional path, but now that he looked at it, he realized he was in too deep to see the beginning anymore.

Maybe he’d always been a little bit in love with Justin. 

These days he definitely was in love with Justin. He had spent a lot of time thinking about the burgeoning crush over the last couple of years and still hadn’t figured out when his attraction to his best friend had really started, but it didn’t matter anymore. His whole body was consumed with the concept of loving Justin Oluransi. 

The match went just about as he had expected. Lardo, Cait, and he broke out their new chaser plays and kept almost exclusive control of the quaffle. He knew better than to try his size intimidation plays on Justin but the new combos clearly took him by surprise and they scored on him several times. He never had to dodge a bludger and knew Liam and Derek had almost exclusive control of them as well. Finn and Browning just weren’t ready for their level of coordination. The two beaters practically lived in each other’s pockets these days. 

Almost too soon, Eric had snuck a snitch catch out from under the nose of Georgia Martin and Hufflepuff had won 250-10. Adam was pleased with the win but did wish the game had gone a bit longer if only to admire Justin at the goalposts and give his team a chance to play together more. 

He landed heavily on the ground and grinned as Justin landed beside him and Lardo. She shook his hand as captains, then Adam jumped in, smacking his hand and kicking off their best friend handshake. Back and forth, around and down, the two of them clapped in sequence, ending with a fist bump. 

“Yes!” Adam cheered. The handshake had gotten more and more complicated over the years and these days it was almost impossible to do perfectly. 

“Good game, Holtzy. You guys are really killing it.”

“You guys played well, too,” Adam grinned, wrapping an arm around Justin’s shoulders as they made their way towards the changing room. “You’ve got a good foundation, just need time to meld and shit.”

“Says the guy who just destroyed us 250 to 10.”

“Not your fault, bro. We’ve been playing together for three years. We had an advantage.”

“I know.”

“Come on, I got a keg for the party, you gotta help me haul it out. It’s gonna be amazing!” 

Justin smiled softly and bumped his fist into Adam’s as they split at the dressing rooms. Adam smiled at his retreating back for a moment before ducking into his own changing room. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Justin**

Quidditch parties at Hufflepuff were always good. They didn’t care who came as long as they were respectful which led to some awesome parties. 

Despite the fact that his team had just been totally slaughtered by the Hufflepuffs, they all nodded easily when he told them about the party in the locker room after his first ever captain speech after a game. They didn’t seem to be bolstered by it much but they had been beaten pretty badly so Justin hadn’t expected much. He was no Kent Parson after all. 

Kent had been captain for the three previous years, playing chaser and leading the team to the Quidditch Cup once and close to it last year. Not getting it for him had broken Justin’s heart. The guy just looked so sad. 

Back in fourth year, when Kent first got named captain, Justin hadn’t been feeling so charitable. Because Holtzy had a crush on Parson that could be seen from space. Yes, Parson had come back for his fifth year with broader shoulders and a cute new haircut. Yes, he had developed a lethal smirk to go along with that. But that doesn’t mean Adam got to crush on him!

Justin had been nursing a crush on Adam for over two years at that point and had come to accept that Adam was more or less straight at that point. But when Kent showed up to grab Justin for practice from the Hufflepuff table in the great hall, Adam’s jaw literally dropped. 

Justin laughed good-naturedly even as his stomach dropped. He bumped fists with Adam and left for practice. He was off all practice, though, and Kent awkwardly pulled him aside and asked if he was alright. Justin had clenched his jaw and nodded, mumbling some excuse before fleeing. Back then, Kent hadn’t known about Justin’s anxiety and let him go. Later on, he wouldn’t have let him go. 

But that time, Kent let him go and Justin went straight to Adam. He always went to Adam even when Adam was the one making him anxious. It was never his fault and he could always help him through it. 

He found Adam in the Great Hall studying and collapsed back into his seat he had vacated after breakfast and leaned onto his best friend. 

Adam flicked his eyes briefly over to him and quickly put down his quill and turned, pulling Justin into a tight hug. He felt like he could breathe again in that tight embrace. 

“Justin?” He asked. “Talk to me?”

Justin shook his head. 

“Okay.” Thank Merlin for Adam Birkholtz. The other boy held him a while longer until Justin relaxed fully and sat up. 

“Thanks, Adam.”

“Literally any time,” Adam smiled softly at him. “You wanna talk about it?”

Justin absolutely did not want to talk about it. His best friend liked boys but he liked boys like Kent Parson. Justin had no chance. 

“No,” Justin said simply. 

“Okay.” Adam still had an arm wrapped around Justin loosely and he squeezed affectionately before dropping the arm. He was such a good friend. Justin didn’t deserve him. 

When Kent came by to check on him later, he had dug into his homework like his world hadn’t completely changed that morning and was trying to give off a chill vibe to that effect. 

“You good, Justin?”

Justin flashed him a grin and a thumbs up. Adam flushed pink. This time Justin was prepared, though. He knocked his knee into Adam’s under the table and when Kent left the table he leaned over to whisper, “You got a little crush, Holtzy?” 

“Shut up!” Adam scoffed. “No!”

“I think you do,” Justin teased. “It’s okay, he looks good with that C doesn’t he?” 

“Oh my god, Justin he’ll hear you!”

Justin had relented, merely knocking his knee into Adam’s again and going back to his homework. So what if his best friend had a crush on his captain? He could handle it. 

Adam had never acted on that crush, though. He’d never acted on any crush, actually. He seemed content to play Quidditch and fuck around with Justin. And Justin was just fine with that. 

He still wasn’t thinking about next year. 

No, he was staying in the here and now; Adam was here and his best friend and throwing a killer party tonight. 

“Holtzy!” He cried out, entering the Hufflepuff common room. 

“Ransy!” Came the answering cry and Justin grinned, following the sound to a corner where Adam was tapping a keg of butterbeer. Justin let him finish before pulling him into a (carefully practised) bro hug. 

“You guys really didn’t waste any time, the party looks good.”

“Thanks, man! You want the first cup?”

“Nah, always too foamy for me.” 

“So smart, Ransy,” Adam grinned at him, pulling the first cup and passing it to someone behind him before pulling one for each of them. “Let’s dance!”

“Oh no, no no no, you are not getting me out on that dance floor. Not tonight.” 

“Please, Justin?” Adam whined. “I just wanna dance!” 

As always, Justin caved. He took a large gulp of his butterbeer so it wouldn’t spill and Adam let out a whoop, knowing he’d won. When Justin lowered his cup, Adam grabbed his hand and pulled him out into the open space that was supposed to be a dance floor. 

As always, the two boys bobbed companionably as they drank and Adam urged his teammates to join them. Soon they had a larger group on the makeshift dance floor and then the song changed, causing the Hufflepuffs surrounding him to whoop. 

“Fast and dangerous!” Adam hollered, and suddenly Justin realized why the new song the team had started at the game earlier sounded so familiar. It was a barely edited version of a fucking Kesha song. The team got louder as they shouted the altered lyrics and Justin carefully removed himself from the chaos, dropping to the side to watch with some Gryffindors. 

_ If you're one of us, then roll with us _

_ 'Cause we make the scoreboard light it up _

_ When we mount our quidditch brooms and ride  _

_ And yes of course we does _

_ We running this school just like a pub _

_ And no, you don't wanna mess with us _

_ Got the Fat Friar on our si-i-ide _

_ I've got my eye on the Snitch  _

_ Bludgers smashed all down the pitch _

_ Got the quaffle through the goal _

_ So let's go-o-o (let's go) _

_ This year we're going har har-har ha-ha-hard _

_ Just like the world is our our-our our-our-ours _

_ We're tearin' it apart part-part pa-pa-part _

_ You know we're superstars, we are Hufflepuff!  _

_ We're flying like we're dum dum-dum dum-dum-dumb _

_ Our bodies goin' num num-num num-num-numb _

_ We'll be forever young youn-youn youn-youn-young _

_ You know we're superstars, we are Hufflepuff _

When they ran out of lyrics about quidditch, the throng collapsed in a huddle and laughed until they were falling over. After the song ended, Adam broke from the group, eyes seeking out Justin’s as always. 

“Ransy!” 

“Hey Holtz,” he smiled at his best friend. “You’re a dork and I love you.”

“Aww, I love you too man!” 

“Was that what you were trying to rhyme last week?”

“Maybe,” Adam said with a blush. 

“I can’t believe you got me to help you rhyme words for a Hufflepuff Kesha parody.”

“Yes you can,” Adam grinned, throwing an arm around his shoulders and leading the way back to the keg. “I think most of my butterbeer ended up on Eric.” 

“I can definitely believe that. What’s up with him anyway? He seems more distracted than usual lately.”

Adam shrugged and made a noise that loosely translated to “no idea”. Justin pulled a new cup for each of them and pulled Adam to the side to drink them before returning to the dance floor. 

“You guys deserve it,” Justin said into the easy silence between them. “You’ve worked so hard to get here. I’m really proud.”

Adam blushed prettily and Justin knocked his shoulder. 

“Come on, let’s dance.” Adam downed the last of his butterbeer and grabbed Justin’s hand, dragging him to the dance floor again. Justin just smiled and let himself be pulled, downing the rest of his cup as they moved among the students. They danced loosely together for a couple of songs until a slower song began and Justin started back for the edge, only to be stopped by Adam’s hand on his wrist. 

He raised an eyebrow at his best friend and Adam gave him a soft smile. 

“Dance with me?”

Justin nodded numbly, despite the warning bells going off in his head, and he let Adam pull him close to him in the suddenly half-empty dance floor. Adam slipped his hands around the small of Justin’s back when he was close and Justin’s arms came up automatically to loop around Adam’s neck. 

Adam began to sway them back and forth in place, looking down at Justin with that same soft smile. 

“What are we doing, B?”

“We’re dancing, Rans.” 

“Different kind of dancing than we normally do,” Justin said back, careful of this moment hanging between them. The skin on his hips and lower back burned through the fabric of his robes where Adam’s arms laid on it. He simultaneously felt the need to pull away from the eye contact and live here in this moment forever. 

The first instinct won and he pulled away halfway through the song, fleeing to the side of the dance floor and collapsing into a couch. Adam was there a moment later. He knelt on the floor in front of Justin, resting his hands gently on his knees as Justin took slow, steadying breaths. 

“I’m sorry,” Adam said after a few. 

“No,” was all Justin managed to get out. He couldn’t handle Adam apologizing for joking about something Justin wanted so badly. Adam nodded and helped him count his breaths in and out instead. When he felt more steady, away from that end of a panic attack, he slipped his hands into Adam’s and squeezed. 

“You wanna go home?” 

Justin nodded. 

“You want me to take you?”

Justin considered. Adam hadn’t done it on purpose. He was just being a good friend. And for all that Adam had started the dance, it wasn’t his fault Justin was in love with him and couldn’t deal with it. And at the end of it all, the only person he wanted to see was Adam. 

He nodded again and Adam took him home. They cuddled up in the empty Gryffindor common room in front of the fire despite Justin’s insistence that Adam returned to the party. 

They talked quietly late into the night and Justin told himself that this was enough. 

~

**Adam**

Adam loved the holidays in the city. He loved the fairy lights on the lampposts. He loved the menorahs in windows and the latkes in his kitchen. He loved giving gifts to his friends and family. And he loved seeing Justin with his family. 

Justin’s family was large and loud, just like his, but where Adam joined in the loud revelry, Justin liked to sit in the middle and bask in it. He’d told Adam once that the noise and movement of his family and all their languages calmed his anxiety like nothing else he’d ever found. 

Since Adam’s family didn’t celebrate Christmas, Justin invited him to his. Adam loved the celebration of the large family sharing in each other’s company and they loved getting him to try progressively spicier foods each year. As he took the tube to Justin’s house, he thought back fondly on the years of Oluransi Christmases. 

The first time he had been to one had been their first year. The two of them had become friends over the first few months of school and since they both lived in London they had made plans to meet up and show each other their parts of the city. Adam had gone first, showing Justin around the docks and shops of the East End, waving to every other person they passed in the street and greeting them by name. 

“How do you know so many people here?”

Adam shrugged, embarrassed by this reminder that Justin lived in such a different part of town from him. “We’re all family here.”

Justin nodded and thought for a moment. “That sounds nice. I don’t get to see my family much.”

“You’ll see them for Christmas, though, right?”

“Yeah,” Justin said with a bright smile. “Christmas is the best. Everyone comes in from all over and fill up the house ‘til it’s bursting, the kitchen so full of food smells you get hungry just walking in, and cousins as far as the eye can see.”

Adam grinned at him. “Sounds awesome.”

“You could come? If you wanted.”

“Really? You’d let me?”

“Are you kidding? I’d love it! And there’s always room for one more at the Adeyemi table.” At Adam’s confused look, Justin continued. “My mom’s side. She runs the kitchen, so she runs Christmas. The Oluransis are just happy to be there.”

They laughed together and Adam wrapped an arm around his best friend’s shoulders as they wandered down another road. 

A few days later, Adam’s mom dropped him off at Justin’s house by way of side-along apparation so she could meet his parents and the house was already overflowing. Justin threw the door open and Adam grinned widely at him as he tackled him into a hug. 

“You must be Justin,” his mom said and Adam looked up and nodded. 

“Justin, this is my mom. Mom, Justin,” he introduced.

“Pleased to meet you Mrs Birkholtz,” Justin greeted politely, holding out his hand to shake. 

“Are you parents around, Justin? I’d like to meet them.”

“Yeah, one second, they wanted to meet you, too,” Justin said, gesturing them into the house. Adam looked around the entrance hall, waving hello to a pair of kids hanging off the stair banister to see who was at the door. After a moment, Justin came back followed by a pair of adults. 

“Adam, Mrs Birkholtz, these are my parents.”

Justin slid back to Adam’s side as the adults exchanged greetings. “I’m so glad you made it,” Justin said quietly. 

“Me too,” Adam agreed. 

This was their seventh Christmas together and his mom had let him take the tube on his own since fourth year when they had given him his first cell phone. Halfway there, Adam suddenly realized that he could have apparated. He pulled out his phone to text Justin. 

Adam: omg ransy

Justin: wat

Adam: i’m on the tube. but i couldve just apparated

Justin: omg

Justin: nerd

Adam chuckled and tucked his phone back into his pocket. As much as he hated being away from Justin for holidays, being able to text him was so nice. Anytime he had a weird thought, he could just pull out his phone and send it to Justin. Some of the kids at school didn’t understand the appeal, but that phone was a lifeline to Adam away from Hogwarts. 

Finally, he arrived at South Kensington and trotted up the stairs to Chelsea. He grinned when he saw Justin waiting for him on the corner and crossed to him, immediately wrapping his arms around his best friend. 

“Hey, Holtzy,” Ransom said when they finally broke apart. “You ready to eat your weight in Nigerian food?”

“Hell yeah! I wore stretchy pants.” He pulled at the waistband and snapped it against his hip. Justin looked at him like he had three heads. “What?”

“Nothing, bro. Come on, we gotta get back before Hannah eats all the chinchin. She is planning on obliterating your taste buds again this year, by the way.”

“We have an accord.”

“What the hell does that even mean, Holtz?”

“It means,” Adam insisted, “that she feeds me delicious food and I provide the entertainment of a white boy eating too much spice. We both win.”

“Whatever you say, B.” They had arrived at Justin’s door. “And hey.”

“What?”

“Happy Christmas, Adam.”

~

**Justin**

The Quidditch stands were lively despite the cold. Everyone was excited to see Hufflepuff thoroughly trounce Slytherin. It wasn’t even a question, really. The Hufflepuff team was phenomenal this year and Slytherin was both only mediocre and tended to vastly underestimate the Hufflepuffs. It was a recipe for a really entertaining game. 

Adam had told him that their strategy was to basically play so squeaky clean Slytherin had no choice but to foul them or lose trying. It was gonna be beautiful to watch. 

The teams took the field, brooms in hand, and the cheers went up from the crowd immediately. Only the knot of Slytherins across the pitch wasn’t singing Adam’s dumb song. Justin loved it, but it was still dumb. He’d barely changed the words at all but the whole school was singing it. 

It had been so many years since their house had won the Quidditch Cup that everyone was cheering for them. Justin really didn’t care too much that they had beat Gryffindor earlier that year, even if he was their captain. They were gorgeous on their brooms. 

Adam was gorgeous. 

As he waited for the captains to shake hands — Lardo looked like she was trying to break Chad’s hand — he thought back to the first Quidditch game he’d attended, the day Adam had adopted him as his best friend. 

“Hi! I’m Adam!” Justin turned to look at the boy. He had to be a first-year, too, he was too round-cheeked and skinny not to be. He was holding his hand out to shake. 

“Hi?” Justin asked, not taking the hand. He’d never seen a Quidditch game in person and as much as he tried he couldn’t keep track of everything going on. 

“I’m in Hufflepuff,” Adam continued, lowering his hand but sitting in the blank space beside Justin. 

“I can tell,” Justin deadpanned. Adam was wearing black and yellow from head to toe and waving an enormous badger flag. 

Adam laughed and it was such a dorky laugh Justin chuckled a little, too. He gave in. “I’m Justin. Gryffindor.”

“Cool! What do you think of the game so far?”

Justin shrugged. Why was this kid trying so hard? Sure, Justin was sitting alone because he hadn’t made any friends yet, but that was no reason to just sit down and talk to him. He’d get there. His mom promised.

“I’ve never seen a game before, there’s so much happening,” Adam said, staring wide-eyed at the students whipping up and down the pitch in their Quidditch robes. 

“Me neither. It’s a lot.” He looked back at the pitch as he pondered what to say next. “Do you like it?”

“Yeah, it’s cool! I think I’ll try out when I’m older. My sister says I’m too small to play yet.”

Justin nodded. The more they talked, the clearer Adam’s accent came out. He seemed to be trying to soften it but the edges of a Cockney accent were clear as the conversation went on.

“Do you know what you wanna play?” Justin had no great desire to play Quidditch now or in the future but the kid was excited and it seemed polite.

“Chaser probably. I have a good arm. I’m killer at dodgeball in gym class,” Adam grinned lopsided and Justin returned it out of habit. 

“Are you muggle-born?” 

Adam’s face fell. “Oh, no, I’m half, but my parents made me go to elementary school. They think it’s ridiculous wizards don’t have one. And my mum wouldn’t have us all running around for eleven years.” 

“My mom said the same thing. And my dad’s a muggle. He wanted us to have at least some maths, too. He’s in finance.”

Adam seemed to relax and he grinned again. “Cool!”

They had talked the rest of the match, and Justin didn’t really mind that he didn’t really follow most of the match, because, by the end of it, he was pretty sure he’d made a friend.

Now he watched that friend — his best friend though no longer his only friend — tear down the Quidditch pitch, using his momentum to slam the quaffle through the goalposts in a perfectly clean goal, the Slytherin keeper scowling in its wake. Justin whooped and Adam pointed at him briefly before shooting back to the middle of the pitch. 

As promised, Hufflepuff’s game was incredibly clean and they drew more penalties as the game went on as Slytherin got more and more frustrated and made stupid decisions. Justin hollered at Mr Mashkov with the rest of the school as he deliberated and eventually awarded another penalty to Adam. 

Chad S scowled as Adam approached for his penalty shot, but Adam just smiled sweetly and sank the shot anyway. Justin screamed in support. He was going to be hoarse tomorrow but he didn’t care. Hufflepuff was destroying Slytherin and his best friend was leading the charge. 

By the time Eric caught the snitch, they had a healthy lead and won it handily. Justin descended on the field with half the Gryffindor team and they jumped on the Hufflepuffs as they landed and shouted raucously with them in celebration. He swung an arm around Adam’s shoulders and led the way to the dressing rooms as he belted Kesha pressed against Justin’s side. 

“You’re ridiculous,” Justin grinned. 

“You love me,” Adam grinned back. 

And boy did Justin love him. His heart ached with how much he loved him. In this particular moment, he longed to yank his best friend in by the sweaty collar of his Quidditch robes and kiss him senseless in the middle of the pitch. But even as he stole a glance at Adam’s lips he knew he wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t ruin their friendship like that. It was much more important than his horny teenage brain would have him believe. 

Adam had never shown interest in him like that. Never let his touch linger or his eyes wander, never blushed at innuendo. He just didn’t like Justin that way. And Justin had to accept that. He tightened his arm around Adam’s shoulder one more time before releasing him and shoving him into the dressing rooms. 

“Go shower, you smell,” he chirped. 

Adam blew him a kiss. Justin was incredibly grateful his dark skin didn’t show a blush easily. ‘He didn’t mean it like that. He’s chirping you,’ he reminded himself firmly. Outwardly, he rolled his eyes and turned to walk with Shruti back to the school. He’d catch up with Adam later when he’d convinced his heart to calm down. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Adam**

Adam loved his team. He loved them so much. 

They had (of course) thrown a party after the thorough trouncing of Slytherin, and he was having a great time. The only problem was he couldn’t find Justin. He was hanging out with Lardo and having fun, but he missed his best friend. 

“Have you seen Justin?” he yelled over the noise to Lardo, bending down so she could hear him. 

She shook her head and looked around to see if she could see him. If he couldn’t from his height, though, she had no chance. “Did he say he was coming?” she asked. 

“He always does,” Adam said, furrowing his brow. “I hope he’s okay. He was acting weird at the match.”

“Go up to Gryffindor?”

“I think I will,” he grinned down at his friend and she one-arm bro-hugged him before shoving him towards the door. As he got there, though, he ran into Justin coming in. 

“You made it!” he cried, looping his arms around Justin. 

“Hey,” Justin said, pulling back which made Adam even more worried. Their hugs usually went on a while. 

“Is something wrong?” 

Justin shook his head but didn’t meet Adam’s eye. “Good game.”

“Thanks, man. You sure you’re good?”

Justin nodded and flicked his gaze quickly to and away from Adam’s eyes. 

“Ransy,” Adam began, taking his best friend’s arm gently. Finally, Justin met his eyes. Was he crying? Adam felt his eyes widen and led the pair of them out of the Hufflepuff common room and into the hall. Justin followed easily, head bowed low. 

When they had reached an alcove, Adam turned to him and held out his arms. Justin collapsed into them, tears staining Adam’s robes. He rubbed his back as he cried and tried to think if he had missed a sign of something being wrong. When Justin’s tears slowed, Adam spoke again.

“Justin?”

Justin hummed into Adam’s robes but didn’t lift his face. 

“Can I help?” 

Justin shook his head against Adam’s chest. 

“Okay,” Adam said, pulling him closer in a tight hug. 

After several more silent moments, Justin spoke, his voice muffled. “Are you dating Larissa?”

“What?” Adam choked out. “No!” 

“Shruti said she heard you were and she asked me if I knew and I—”

“Justin,” Adam pulled him by his shoulders away from his chest by his shoulders so he could look him in the eye. “I am not dating Lardo, I’m pretty sure she’s dating Shitty Knight from Ravenclaw anyway, and I wouldn’t  _ ever  _ ask someone out and not tell you. You’re my best friend.” 

“I just thought—,” Justin cut himself off with a shake of his head. “Anxiety brain.”

“I know, bro. But you can always talk to me.” 

Justin grimaced but nodded. “Sorry for freaking out. That was just a shitty way to hear that you...” he trailed off again.

“You don’t have to apologize, Ransy,” Adam said with a smile. His heart ached for his best friend and he held out his arms for another hug. This time, Justin held him tight instead of just collapsing against him. He wracked his brain for something to say to help his friend and eventually decided on the simple truth. “I love you, Justin.”

He knew Justin didn’t love him like that. Hell,  _ he _ barely understood his own love for Justin. But he knew it was true. 

“I love you, too, B,” Justin whispered from his shoulder. The words made Adam’s heart soar with hope like they always did (it didn’t seem to listen to his brain when those words came out of Justin’s mouth), but he tamped it down. His friend needed him to be his friend, not to pine after him like an idiot. Justin was so much more than he could ever deserve. He was happy just to have this. 

After several more moments of silence, they gently broke apart. “Do you wanna go back to the party?” Justin asked, wiping his nose on his robe sleeve. 

Adam shrugged. “Wanna hang out with you. I’m open.”

Justin smiled as though Adam had just hung the moon for him, or maybe that was just wishful thinking again. “You wanna go up to the astronomy tower?”

“Yeah,” Adam grinned, wrapping his arm around Justin’s shoulders and heading to the stairs that wound up through the castle to the tallest tower. As they walked, they recapped the game easily, Adam occasionally reenacting something and Justin chirping him casually. It felt good to be back on even footing. 

They made it up to the tower and leaned over the parapet to gaze at the starry sky over the Forbidden Forest. Adam pressed his arm against Justin’s and lost himself in the swirls of the Milky Way.

“You don’t get this in London,” he said on cue. One of them always did. 

The first couple of times he’d snuck off to the astronomy tower to star-gaze he hadn’t told anyone, just stared transfixed at the sheer number of stars he could see from its height. Even on the ground, the stars were intense at Hogwarts with no light pollution to block the view. 

From the tower? It was  _ magical _ .

No pun intended. 

Late in their first year, Justin had caught him at it. 

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude,” Justin had said, starting to backtrack towards the stairs. 

“I’m just, um, looking at stuff. You can stay. If you want?” Adam held his breath. He didn’t know why he was nervous. 

“The stars?” Justin asked, stopping his retreat. 

“Yeah, you, uh, you can’t see them like this in London, you know?”

Justin smiled, at last, and joined Adam at the parapet. “You really can’t.” 

The two boys fell into awed silence as they gazed over the spread of stars.

“Have you ever seen the sky like this before?” Adam asked. 

“My family went out to the coast a few years ago. It was kind of like this. But they’re… different. Over the sea.”

Adam nodded in the dark. He’d never been to the coast but it made sense. “Everything is different up here. I’m still getting used to it. I feel like I should have already. But it’s… so much.”

“Me too,” Justin murmured. “I miss London. And my family. And my bed.”

“Me too,” he said quietly.

“I love it here!” Justin insisted. “I just thought I’d adjust by now, I guess. It’s almost the end of the school year.”

“Yeah,” Adam agreed. “I wish sometimes I wasn’t a wizard so I could stay home and go to school with my friends. But up here, it all seems bigger. Worth it, somehow.” Not looking at his friend’s face somehow made it easier to talk so candidly. 

“I know what you mean.”

“I’m glad we’re friends,” Adam finished. It felt flat against the backdrop of galaxies, but it felt right. 

“I am, too.” 

Since then, the two of them had often escaped together to the tower to look out over the forest and marvel at something bigger than themselves. It calmed him, and he knew it calmed Justin, too. They went together most times, but sometimes one or the other would escape up on their own and the other would always find him, somehow.

“I’m going to miss this,” Adam whispered into the night. 

He felt Justin look at him. “The stars?”

“Yeah, kinda. But also,  _ this _ ,” he gestured between them. “Us. Up here.”

Justin didn’t answer and Adam continued to stare out at the darkness. 

He took a deep breath and continued. “I know we’ll always be friends. But it won’t ever be like this after we graduate. Just us, in a bubble at the top of the world.”

Justin made a noise beside him that Adam couldn’t identify and he finally looked over at him. Justin was staring resolutely out over the grounds but his eyes seemed shiny again. 

“Rans,” Adam began, but he was cut off by Justin throwing himself at Adam. He absorbed the hug and squeezed Justin tightly. 

“Best friends forever,” Justin insisted. 

“Forever,” Adam confirmed, his stomach dropping to his toes.

~

**Justin**

The NEWTs were gonna kill him, Justin was sure. He was so grateful he had Adam by his side even though they weren’t taking all the same exams, just so he could stay on track and be reminded to take regular breaks for food, water, and sleep.

Adam was the best. 

Ever since their last night on the astronomy tower after the Slytherin-Hufflepuff match, though, Justin had been kicking himself for his actions. Or lack thereof, really. He had been so close to just throwing it all to the wind and kissing Adam that night and the more he thought about their conversation that night the more he thought Adam would have wanted it, too. 

But he hadn’t. So he sat beside his best friend and tried not to be upset at himself. There was still time. Not a lot of time, but there was still time. Maybe he could kiss him at the Quidditch Cup party when Hufflepuff beat Ravenclaw? 

He shook himself out of that train of thought. This was enough. Being friends with Adam was not a consolation prize. He was happy, dammit. He was. 

“You need a break, Rans?” Adam’s voice interrupted his mental battle and he looked up to see worried blue eyes watching him from across the table. “Maybe some water?”

Justin nodded, not trusting his voice, and took the proffered water bottle. Adam had unscrewed the cap for him and he took several large gulps before handing it back. “Thanks, B.”

Adam smiled at him and Justin was sure he wouldn’t do anything to ever cause that smile to disappear from his life. Even if it meant he’d never get to kiss him. 

He was hopeless. 

They studied for another hour before Adam declared it to be dinner time and they packed up and left the library. Justin let the conversation wash over him at dinner and let Adam explain away his silence as exam stress. 

It reminded him of when he had first started crushing on Adam back in their second year. It had been a tamer and less intense thing than the love he now harboured for him, an adolescent crush. And it had all started when exams approached and suddenly Justin was incredibly nervous. All the time.

Justin had been stressed for first year exams, sure — who wasn’t stressed about exams? — but he hadn’t realized just how much work they required until they were over. And now they approached again and he was so nervous. What if they were worse than last year? What if he  _ did  _ flunk out?  _ How was he supposed to handle this much stress at just thirteen? _

His parents took him to a doctor the summer after second year that had helped a lot with finding words to talk about his anxiety as well as some low dose medication he could take to manage it. And though the thought of exams still made his heart race, he had a better handle on it these days. 

But in second year, all he had was Adam.

Adam had recognized his stress was somehow more than it should be and learned how to interrupt the panic attacks (he knew that’s what they were now), bringing Justin back down to the ground and moving him away from whatever was stressing him out. 

They had never been shy about touching each other, but the way Adam touched him during those early anxiety attacks, grounding him and bringing him back to the present, made his face heat. 

At first, he’d figured it was just embarrassment, but when Adam’s other touches began to elicit the same reaction, Justin took some time to evaluate his feelings. He liked when Adam touched him. He liked to hug him and be goofy with him, and he liked to think about doing more than that. Holding hands, maybe even kissing him. They were pleasant butterflies, as opposed to the nervous ones caused by exams, and Justin hoarded them like treasures. 

They made it through exams and Justin spent the week awaiting results plastered to his best friend’s side, memorizing every touch in his youthful crush. 

The Gryffindor Keeper, Johnson, had sighed when he saw them cuddling one night in front of the common room fire. “I love this, such a good foundation for a mutual pining slow burn.”

“What?” Justin asked. 

“Is it true you dropped off the house team?” Adam asked at the same time.

Johnson had laughed and answered only Adam’s question. “Yeah, I gotta make room for Oluransi, here. Important to the plot that you’re both on the house teams.”

“We don’t know if we’ll make it yet,” Adam had pointed out. 

“Don’t question him, his clarifications are weirder than the original statements,” Justin had interrupted.

Johnson shrugged and wandered off. 

“Is he a seer?” 

“I honestly don’t know,” Justin said, shrugging. “Is this weird? Us cuddling like this?”

“No! Of course not. You’re my best friend,” Adam insisted, tugging Justin closer. 

“Good,” Justin said, relishing in the closeness and letting the butterflies in his stomach take off again. 

Since then, each year, the feeling had gotten more intense, until the thought of ever living without him was unbearable. He didn’t even care if Adam never loved him back, he just couldn’t give him up in his life. 

After dinner that night, Justin asked if they could take a walk before they went back to studying. 

As they exited the front doors, Adam stole a look over at him and must have been worried because he wrapped a long arm around Justin’s shoulders and furrowed his brow. “You okay, Justin?”

“Have you thought about next year?” Justin asked. 

Adam blinked at him but rolled with the topic. “I’ll probably go back to London. I’m really not sure what I want to do and eighteen is so young to be on my own. I’d rather be home, you know?”

“I get that. I miss London, too.”

“What about you?”

“The same, I think. Go home. Or. I was thinking, maybe we could get a flat?”

Adam stopped walking. “You’d want to do that?”

Justin turned to look at him. “I’d love it.” He smiled and tried to pour all of his emotions into it. “I meant what I said the other night. I want to be your best friend forever. I think we’d have a great time.”

“Rans, that would be so cool!” Adam shouted. 

Justin laughed. “It wouldn’t be like here at school, but I just thought…”

“I would love to be your flatmate, Ransy,” Adam declared seriously, then tackled Justin in a hug. 

Justin breathed him in. ‘This is enough, this is enough, this is enough,’ he told himself. 

Adam pulled back and began to ramble about where they should live, how to set up their flat, everything about their adult life together. Again, Justin wondered if this was the moment. If he should just kiss him and let all of his emotions out in the open. If it would ever be “the moment” or if he was doomed to spend his entire life pining after his best friend. 

He let it pass him by again — if it was a “moment” at all — and the pair began to walk back up to the castle, plans and excitement flying high. 

~

**Adam**

The final quidditch game of the year would decide the winner of the Quidditch Cup. Adam had watched Ravenclaw and Gryffindor battle it out a couple of weeks before, and the team was good. 

(Gryffindor had also gotten even better, though, and they had beat Ravenclaw a couple of weeks back in a brutal match. Adam was glad Justin had won but it also meant that Ravenclaw was desperate today.) 

They needed to win by 200 points to edge out Slytherin who had beat Gryffindor and Ravenclaw by wide margins, but Adam had faith in his team. This was their year. 

As they dressed for the match, Adam began to sing and soon the whole team (except Liam, who refused to sing anything ever and instead conducted with a goofy grin) was screaming out the modified Kesha song. 

“WE ARE HUFFLEPUFF!”

The match flew by. One of the Gryffindor chasers forced his team to take a time out to scold him to stick to the plays. They’d managed only 10 points on Chris to their 80 on Dustin Snow’s goal hoops when Eric snagged the snitch out from under their seeker Tony Tangredi’s nose and they had  _ done it _ . 

As soon as the whistle blew the entire stadium erupted in ‘Hufflepuff’s Year’ and Adam floated to the ground in a euphoric haze. They had won by 220 points and secured the Quidditch Cup for Hufflepuff for the first time in over a decade. 

By the time he reached the ground, Justin had made his way onto the pitch and tackled him to the ground. 

Mind high on winning, he was transported back to celebrating with Justin after they had made their respective house teams in their third year. 

He had read his name on the sheet next to Larissa’s and let out a whoop before running from the Hufflepuff common room and into the Great Hall. 

“Ransy!” 

“Holtzy!” 

“Did you get on?” he continued shouting as he crossed the massive room.

“Yeah! Did you?” Justin exclaimed, lowering his volume a bit as Adam came nearer. Adam grinned and nodded and Justin tackled him in a hug that knocked him into the Ravenclaw table with a laugh. 

“Oi!” someone shouted and Justin pulled him back to standing without releasing his hold on him. 

“Proud of you, Adam,” Justin said softly. 

“Proud of you, too, Justin.” 

This was like that. But a million times better.

“You did it, you did it, you did it!” Justin shouted in his ear. Adam couldn’t tell if he was laughing or crying, smiling or gaping. Honestly, it was probably a bit of all of the above. 

“Justin,” he gasped out from under his best friend. 

He sat up but Adam continued to lay in the grass dazed. 

“We did it,” he told the clouds.

“You did. I’m so proud of you, B. You have no idea.” Justin’s eyes were glistening, too, when Adam looked at him and he grabbed his robes and pulled him back to the ground, holding him tight to his chest. 

They hugged like that for a long moment until Lardo jumped on them and Adam forced his eyes open, unsure when he had squeezed them shut. Justin stood awkwardly and Adam watched him curiously, rubbing at the spot on his hip where Justin’s wand had dug into him. 

But then he saw Justin discretely adjust the front of his robes and Adam’s face heated quickly. Had Justin gotten hard from… that? Suddenly, the way he had been holding Justin felt inappropriate. 

He stood and lifted Lardo into the air to have something to do with his hands and to give Justin a chance to calm down. Boners came at weird times. Nothing to read into it, right? 

Only… Adam thought it was more than that. They weren’t 14 anymore. And it had been a very suggestive pose. Maybe there  _ was  _ something to read into. 

The team carried Lardo up to the castle on their shoulders, the school trailing behind them and singing. Justin fell into step beside him halfway up the path and Adam shifted his grip on Lardo’s shoulder to wrap his arm around Justin. 

He was still thinking about their awkward moment but he also needed to show Justin he didn’t mind. Well, he didn’t hold it against him, at least. But it was also suddenly glaringly obvious that for all that he’d been in love with his best friend for at least the last two years, he’d never been  _ turned on  _ by him. 

He’d had morning wood, sure. He’d taken care of himself like any teenaged boy. But he’d never thought about Justin  _ like that _ . What if Justin thought of him like that? Was that a good thing? A bad thing? Something to avoid forever?

He decided on the last one. He wasn’t going to risk their friendship by asking him out so it was a moot point. Instead, Adam started another round of ‘Hufflepuff’s Year’ as they set Lardo down to pass through the narrow halls to the Hufflepuff Common Room. Once inside, he set to work hauling out the hidden keg and tapping it, Justin by his side as always. 

They lost themselves in the music and the butterbeer, Adam making sure there were no slow songs played just in case, and he tried to put it from his mind. 

“Birkholtz!” Lardo steered a fifth year boy who she was riding the shoulders of over to him in the crowd. “Swap,” she directed, and Adam laughed as he swung Lardo easily onto his shoulders instead. 

“Sup, Lards?”

“You’re thinking too hard, my dude. Less thinking, more drinking.” 

“You know there’s barely any alcohol in butterbeer, right?”

“So get some firewhiskey!” She crowed and someone in the crowd whooped. 

“Nah, I’m not feeling it,” he shrugged, bouncing Lardo on his shoulders. She looked down at him upside down with a frown. 

“Lemme down.” 

He swung her down and to the floor and she pulled him to the side of the party. “What’s going on?”

“So you know how I’m kinda… in love with Justin?” He whispered the last bit and relied on Lardo being able to read his lips. She nodded knowingly so he continued. “I realized tonight that I’ve never… y’know, thought about him…  _ like that _ . So now I’m not sure that I’m actually… in love?” 

She quirked an eyebrow. 

“You’d do anything for him?” He nodded. “Seeing his smile makes your entire day?” Another nod. “Wanna cuddle him forever and hold his hands and take him to his favourite places and cook him his favourite foods?” 

“Yeah.”

“And kiss his face?” 

Adam nodded, more hesitant now. He definitely wanted all of that, but where was she going with it? 

“That’s love, my dude. Just because you don’t wanna bone doesn’t mean you don’t love him.”

Adam was confused. Romantic love meant sex… didn’t it?

“I don’t get it.”

“Well, could be a couple of things. Wish I had my books I could explain it better. But it could be platonic love like I feel for you, the eternal and non-romantic love of bro-hood. Though I have no interest in kissing you, so that bit probably means it’s romantic of some variety. Or it could be asexual love. Romantic love without sexual attraction.”

“That’s a thing?”

Lardo nodded wisely. 

“But what if he wants sex? And I don’t?”

“You could still have a good time with sex, even if you’re ace — asexual — if you wanna try it, but you could also just stick to kissing and cuddling and Justin would still be head over heels in love with you.” Adam began to interrupt but she held up a hand and he closed his mouth. “I have eyes, Birkholtz. And that boy is in love with you.” 

Adam took a steadying breath. “So what do I do?”

Lardo shrugged. “Tell him if you want. Kiss him if he wants. Move into a flat and be disgustingly cute together for always if you both want.”

“We kinda already planned to get a flat,” Adam added shyly. 

Lardo threw up her hands. “Just tell him, Adam. Put us all out of our misery.” 

“I’ll think about it,” he promised. 

“That’s all I ask. You still wanna be my ride? My cup runneth dry.” 

Adam grinned and hoisted her back onto his shoulders, slipping through the crowd to the keg. 

By the end of the night, he’d largely put the earlier incident out of his head but was still thinking about what Lardo had said. Maybe he could borrow one of those books she mentioned? 

It made a lot of sense and it felt right when he collapsed onto Justin on the couch as the party wound down, keeping his weight mostly off the other boy but still settling on his shoulder in an exhausted cuddle. 

“‘M so tired,” he whined.

Justin laughed. “You deserved to party it up, Holtzy.”

“‘M glad you’re here, Ransy.”

He felt Justin hum through the cheek pressed to his chest. “Me, too, B.” 

Adam knew he was dozing off but he didn’t care. Justin was a good pillow, the party was more or less over, and he had won the Quidditch Cup. His eyes twitched open when he felt Justin’s hand slide into his hair. 

“Is this okay?” Justin murmured above him. 

“Yeah,” Adam breathed, afraid to disturb the soft moment. 

An indeterminate amount of time later he jerked awake as Justin shifted under him, his voice rumbling in the chest Adam had fallen asleep on. “Come on, Adam, let’s get you to bed.”

“But I’m comfy here,” Adam complained, nuzzling into Justin in what was either stupidity or bravery. Justin sighed but when Adam twisted to look up at him he saw a fond smile on his face. 

“I’ll stay with you if you want,” Justin offered.

Adam nodded, the motion dizzying at this strange angle. 

Justin smiled a little wider and stood from the couch, bringing Adam with him and taking them up to bed. 

As he fell asleep wrapped around his best friend, Adam had never been more sure that he was in love.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The tagged anxiety attack happens in Justin's first section

**Justin**

Quidditch was over. Classes were over. The school had a week off to study and rest for exams. For Justin, that meant NEWTs. 

He wasn’t handling it well. 

He was taking four NEWTs — three the same as Adam — and he had an exam each day except Wednesday. He had his study table written out and colour coded. He had his emergency prescription for bad panic attacks in his bag. He had been taking his anti-anxiety medication daily, just like he was supposed to. 

So why couldn’t he _breathe_.

He was vaguely aware of still being in the Gryffindor common room. He was pretty sure he was on the floor but he had no idea how he got there. The clothes on his skin felt like sandpaper. His chest was tight.

Someone laid a hand on his forearm and he stared unseeing at them, curling his arm protectively into his chest. 

“Get Birkholtz,” the face said.

Justin tried to nod, he was sure, but he couldn’t be sure he had done it. He still couldn’t breathe. He tried to count his breaths like his therapist had taught him, like Adam had helped him practice when it all got too much, but he kept losing count. He needed to be grounded but he couldn’t hear anything over the roaring in his ears and he couldn’t focus on anything around the stars in his field of vision. 

One, two, three, fuck fuck FUCK he couldn’t do this! He couldn’t take these exams! He couldn’t go out into the world and get a _job_ , who was he kidding? And even worse, he couldn’t go move in with Adam like they were just best friends and torment himself forever with being almost close enough but never quite there. But he also couldn’t _tell_ him. 

There was no way he could tell him. 

He couldn’t do _anything_. 

He _still couldn’t breathe._

“Justin!” 

The word was firm and just loud enough to be heard over the roaring in his ears. His eyes snapped up to his friend towering over him, and Adam quickly fell to his knees beside Justin. 

“Can I touch you?” Adam whispered. Justin nodded, his eyes locked on him. He slid his hands up Justin’s arms from wrist to elbow, firmly grasping his biceps.

Justin closed his eyes and focused on the feeling of Adam’s hands. 

“Can you try to match your breathing to mine?” Adam asked, drawing in a long slow breath loudly. “And hold for four.” Adam breathed out. “Out, two, three, four.” 

Justin tried to stop gasping and match with Adam. It was Adam. He just needed to breath with Adam. 

“That’s it, you’re doing great babe, another one for me. In for one, two, three, four.” 

Justin gulped in another breath. 

“You’re okay, slowly does it, you don’t have to do it all at once, I’ve got you.”

The words didn’t mean much to him but their presence reassured him and he knew what to do and with Adam to lead him he could do it. He could. He could do anything with Adam. 

He breathed around the square a few times, feeling his lightheadedness fade as his body took in oxygen. When he felt less like he was about to faint, he pried his eyes open and found the reassuring, if worried, blue of Adam’s eyes looking into his own. 

“Hi,” he choked out. 

“Hey there, Ransy,” Adam smiled softly. “You back with us?”

Justin nodded and moved his arms to push himself up. 

“Woah, give yourself a minute, Justin—“

Adam didn’t stop him from moving, but his hands still rested lightly on Justin’s arms. He kept pushing himself up, sitting up just enough to collapse forward onto Adam’s chest, who caught him securely. Justin gripped Adam’s sweater like a lifeline. 

“You’re okay, I’ve got you,” Adam promised from above him, rubbing slow circles into his back. 

“I can’t do it,” Justin said into his sweater.

“What’s that?”

“I can’t do it,” Justin repeated. “I can’t take these exams and walk out into the world like I’m an adult. I’m not an adult.”

“Shhh,” Adam shushed him softly. “You don’t have to be. You can go home for a bit if you want. Figure out what you want to do.”

“No!” Justin exclaimed, pulling away from Adam so he could see his face. He could feel his heart starting to race again. They were gonna get a flat! Adam couldn’t leave him! “I need you! Don’t make me do it alone!”

“Justin, I’m just down the road.” His face looked sad but determined. “We’ll text and hang out all the time and—”

“No, I _need_ you.”

“Oh.” Realization was dawning on Adam’s face but Justin needed to say it all. 

“I want you to be there when I wake up and I want to see you every day and know you’re alright and I want you to cuddle me when I’m anxious and I want to feed you food that’s too spicy and… I love you, Adam. I need you, however you’ll have me. Don’t leave me. Please.”

“Never,” Adam whispered. He reached out and took Justin’s face in his hands. “I love you, too. I want all those things, too.”

“But?” Justin could taste it in the air. 

“But,” Adam took a deep breath, voice barely audible even though their foreheads were nearly touching. “I think I’m asexual. I don’t think I’ll ever really want… _sex_. But I love you in a very romantic way and I want to kiss you but I don’t want you to think—”

“I don’t care!” Justin said, suddenly too loud for the bubble of quiet they’d created in their whispering. He dropped his voice again, fitting his hands over Adam’s where they still sat on his jaw. “Adam, I don’t care. I told you. I want you however you’ll have me. If that means just friendship forever, I’ll… figure it out. If you’ll let me kiss you and sleep in a bed with you every night, I’ll be ecstatic. Everything else is just icing. Whatever you want, I’m yours.”

“Really?” Adams eyes looked wet. 

“Really,” Justin answered. “Can I kiss you now?” 

Adam whimpered before pulling Justin into a kiss with his hands still on Justin’s jaw. 

Justin’s eyes fluttered shut as Adam sealed their lips together. His face felt hot and his spine tingled. He slid a hand into Adam’s hair and adjusted the angle to avoid squishing his nose, drawing another whimper from his best friend — boyfriend? — that made his heart race. 

Finally, they broke apart and Justin leaned his forehead back against Adam’s, gasping again but for a completely different reason. 

“Cor blimey, that’s wot we’ve been missin’?”

“You’re telling me,” Justin laughed, delighting in Adam’s accent showing itself in the heat of the moment. His eyes fell closed again as he basked in the joy of the moment. Suddenly he sat up straight. “We’re in the middle of the common room.”

Adam looked at him with wide eyes. Justin looked to the side and saw Shruti give him a thumbs up before pulling her wand from her sleeve and moving her mouth. 

“What?” 

The _muffliato_ charm she had cast fell from around them and the room burst into applause. Justin’s face heated but he let Adam help him to his feet and wrap his arm around Justin’s shoulders. Justin slipped his own around Adam’s waist, pressing against him like he always wanted to. 

“Thanks Shruti,” he mumbled as she approached them. 

“Got your back, Cap.” She held out a fist and he bumped it. “And can I just say? Fucking finally!”

Adam laughed, his cheeks darkening somehow more than they had been before. Justin leaned up and kissed one of them. 

“Oh Merlin, that’s so cute it’s almost gross,” Shruti laughed. “Get out of here, you two.” 

Justin didn’t even argue, just let Adam drag him from the common room. 

He’d never imagined this day would ever come. Adam had a hold of his hand and was leading him down the hall and looked back at him with a huge grin on his face, his cheeks still dusted pink. The moment suddenly brought him back to the summer after third year. 

Adam had been leading him through a crowd and had taken his hand after they’d nearly gotten separated. Instead of clasping it with his whole hand, though, Adam had laced their fingers together. He’d looked back at Justin the same way, a blush on his cheeks and a un-self-conscious grin on his face. 

Justin had squeezed his hand and Adam had squeezed back before facing forward again and winding through the crowd confidently. Justin’s stomach had taken up residence in his throat. It hit him all of a sudden that this was more than a crush on his best friend. 

He had fallen in love with Adam Birkholtz. 

And now? Now Adam Birkholtz was in love with him, too. 

~

**Adam**

Justin pulled him to the side of the corridor and into a classroom. 

“You don’t wanna go further away?” Adam asked. 

“Don’t wanna wait anymore. All of Gryffindor already saw us kiss. Don’t care if we get caught.” He tugged Adam closer again so their chests nearly touched. For a moment they just stood there, breathing each other’s air. 

“You love me,” Adam whispered, hardly believing it.

“I love you,” Justin confirmed. “Say it again?”

“I love you,” Adam said with a grin. “Can I kiss you again?”

Justin nodded and pulled Adam down for another kiss with a gentle hand on the back of his neck. Their lips met again and Justin sighed into it. 

It was… wet? 

He supposed that made sense but he’d never really thought about the mechanics of kissing before. He felt Justin part his lips slightly but didn’t match him immediately and Justin closed them again, instead sliding a hand up into Adam’s hair. Adam broke away with a giggle. 

“Holtzy?” Justin looked terrified and Adam rushed to sooth. He leaned his forehead against Justin’s. 

“I’m sorry. It tickled.”

“I’ve touched your hair before,” Justin grumbled.

“I dunno, Ransy, it just did.” He tried to focus on Justin’s eyes but their faces were too close. “Can we try again?”

Justin nodded and settled his hands on Adam’s hips instead. Adam didn’t know what to do with his hands and ended up awkwardly grasping Justin’s elbows.

Now it was Justin’s turn to giggle. Merlin, they were a mess. 

“What?” Adam asked with a shy smile, even though he knew he was being awkward. 

Justin took his hands and pulled them up to his neck. Adam let himself rest there and Justin returned his own hands to Adam’s hips. He leaned in again and Adam’s eyes followed him, crossing over his nose. 

“Adam. Babe. Close your eyes. Just, follow my lead, okay?”

“Like you’re such an expert,” Adam chirped, his cheeks flaring hot at the pet name. Justin had always destroyed him with nicknames before, slipping them so easily into conversation, and now it seemed he was determined to add even more.

“Let’s just say I’ve thought about it. A lot.” 

Adam blinked. He’d never really thought about it, but Justin hadn’t dated either. “Have you ever—?”

Justin shook his head and ducked it down into his chest. “It’s always been only you for me, Holtzy.”

And, well, Adam had to kiss him for that. As smoothly as he could, he slid one hand under Justin’s chin and tiled it back up to his own lips. 

And promptly got his nose caught on Justin’s. 

He pushed through, though, and pressed his lips to Justin’s. Justin chuckled softly but soon it was lost in a quiet whine and a tightening grip on Adam’s hips. Adam tried to move his lips as Justin had done before and it felt kinda weird, but Justin tilted his head and opened his lips in return with another sound and that felt nice. Adam smiled into the kiss, breaking them apart. 

“Is this okay?” Justin whispered, his lips brushing Adam’s as he spoke. 

“It’s kind of weird,” Adam whispered back, letting his lips brush Justin’s in return. “But I like it.”

“Yeah? You don’t have to like it, Adam. I told you, I just want you—”

“I know, babe. But I like it.”

“Okay,” Justin smiled again. He ducked his head to one side and began to kiss along Adam’s jaw. 

“Oh.” The sweet presses of lips were making his skin tingle. Adam’s hand fell to Justin’s chest and he pressed it into the muscle over his heart. “That’s nice.” 

Justin straightened and grinned. “Yeah?” 

Adam nodded and ducked his head to try the same on Justin. He kissed up his jaw and then down the side of his neck. Justin gasped and Adam raised his head. 

“No, do that again,” Justin whispered, tilting his head to the side to give Adam better access. Adam dipped down and tried to press his lips to the same spot, slipping his right hand around to splay across Justin’s back. 

Tentatively, he flicked his tongue out to touch the spot — it seemed to be right on his pulse — and Justin swore and toppled into Adam. He balanced him and kissed back up to Justin’s jaw, barely making it halfway to his mouth before Justin turned and captured his lips again. 

They were pressed completely against each other, now, and Adam loved the feeling of Justin in his arms. The muscles in his back shifted as he gripped Adam back and moved his lips against his. Suddenly, Justin stiffened against him and pulled away. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled. Adam stared at him for a moment before he realized what had happened. He looked down between them and saw why Justin had pulled away. 

“It’s okay.”

“It’s too much,” Justin said. 

Adam wasn’t sure if he meant for Adam or for himself. Adam nodded. “Then let’s do this.” He took hold of Justin’s waist and gently pulled him closer without pressing himself flush against him and laid a kiss on Justin’s cheek. “Is this okay?” 

“Yeah,” Justin smiled. “You’re the best, B.”

“Merlin, do you know how much those nicknames destroy me?” Adam blurted. He pressed a quick kiss to Justin’s lips before continuing. “‘Holtzy let’s cuddle by the fire’, ‘B is this sweater a good color on me?’ ‘Holtz let’s be roommates and best friends forever’”. 

“It worked, didn’t it, _babe_?” Justin chirped with a smile. 

Adam chuckled. “Yeah it did, babe.”

“I like it when you call me babe.” 

“I like it when you call me babe, too. I like it when you call me anything at all.” 

“How about… ‘best thing that ever happened to me’?” Justin kissed him. 

“Sap.”

“Your sap, though.”

Adam grinned at him and kissed him again. 

This time, Adam kept space between their bodies but let his hands rove over Justin’s arms and back. He trailed kisses down Justin’s neck and delighted in the sounds it drew from him. Justin squeezed his hips and kissed his neck and even slipped his tongue into Adam’s mouth for a bit. Adam didn’t know what to do with that part but it was all quite lovely. 

When they broke apart again, they were both breathing heavily. 

“Is this okay?” Justin asked again. 

“It’s amazing,” Adam breathed. “I like kissing you.”

“I really like kissing you,” Justin said with a laugh. “I don’t want it to be a problem but I _really_ like it.”

“It’s not a problem unless we let it be, Ransy. It’s us. We can do anything.” He kissed Justin on the nose. Justin buried his face in Adam’s sweater. 

They stood there, wrapped in each other for a long moment. 

“Dinner? I’m famished so you must be, too,” Justin said, voice muffled but audible. 

“Now that you mention it…” Adam hummed. 

“Let’s go eat, babe.” 

Adam grinned and laced his fingers through Justin’s, ready to face anything the world threw at them. Together. Finally.

~

_Six months later_

**Justin**

Adam put the paper down as Justin entered the kitchen. 

“You’re up early,” he commented. 

“Bed was cold,” Just grumbled, sliding up behind his boyfriend and dropping a kiss on his hair. 

“Sorry, babe,” Adam said. “I made waffles though. Will you forgive me?”

Justin smiled and crossed to the oven, peering in to see the waffles keeping warm. “I suppose.” He shot a grin over his shoulder and Adam rolled his eyes with a smile of his own before crossing to join Justin at the stove. 

“Hi,” Adam murmured, closing their lips together. Justin’s heart thrilled. It had been months since Adam had first kissed him and he still was not used to being able to do this. He slid an arm around Adam’s waist and pulled him back in for another kiss. Adam’s cheeks were pink when he opened his eyes again. 

“Hi. So, waffles?”

“Yes, waffles,” Adam nodded, stepping back from the embrace and leaning over to open the oven door. Justin swatted his arse playfully with the oven mitts before handing them to him. 

“Incorrigible.”

Justin grinned but let him plate the waffles and turned to collect toppings and silverware.

Once they were seated with their breakfast, Adam spoke again.

“What’s the plan for today?”

“Hmm,” Justin hummed. It was Sunday and neither of them had to work or be anywhere that he could think of. “We should go for a walk. See the city.”

“We both know this city already,” Adam laughed. 

“Not together, we don’t. Indulge me. It’ll be fun.”

Adam smiled softly and agreed. “Anything you wanna see?”

Justin shrugged. “Wherever our feet take us.”

“Alright.”

They ate in silence for a few moments before Justin spoke again. “And maybe afterwards we get curry and cuddle up for a movie? I was hoping for lazy Sunday morning cuddles but someone had to get up and cook.”

“You can’t complain while eating what I made,” Adam pointed at him with his fork. 

“Too late, already did.”

After they’d eaten, the two pulled on jackets and left the flat, stopping first in their favorite coffee shop then wandering to the nearby park to admire the autumn colors bursting into life there. With one hand, Justin held his coffee and with the other he held Adam’s hand. 

He let Adam wind them through some paths to a secluded bench and sit down together. “What’s up, B? You look like you’re thinking about something.”

“I love you.”

Justin blinked. “I love you, too,” he said automatically, still a little concerned at the furrowed brow on his boyfriend’s face. 

“I’m just so scared I’m going to screw this up.” Adam looked away, gaze skittering across the park. 

“Holtzy—” Justin cut in.

“Please let me finish?”

Justin nodded and waited for Adam to regain his momentum. 

“You’re the most important person in my life. You have been for a really long time. And I love dating you!” he swung his gaze back to Justin finally. “I love waking up next to you and cooking for you and cuddling and kissing and… the other stuff we’ve tried is nice, too.”

Justin’s face heated at the reference. Adam had insisted that his being ace didn’t mean he was sex-repulsed; he just never had the urge to try it. Justin completely lost his cool when Adam had informed him he wanted to try hand stuff and maybe blowjobs in such a casual tone. But he wanted to and Justin definitely wanted to, so they’d tried it. 

And Adam had enjoyed himself. Perhaps not the way Justin had, but they had talked about it like adults and decided some sex should definitely be a part of their relationship. Justin was still getting used to this idea. 

He pulled himself back to the present. “What are you worried about, then?”

“What if it doesn’t last?” Adam said quietly. 

When he didn’t continue, Justin squeezed his hand and tried to reassure him. “It’s you and me, Adam. It’ll always last.”

“But what if this part of ‘you and me’ doesn’t? Will we still be ‘you and me’?”

Justin seriously doubted that would happen but as an anxious person himself, he could see the anxiety in Adam’s words. “I really think it will, B. But if it doesn’t, I promise I won’t let it mess us up. I will always love you, however you’ll let me. If you never wanna kiss again, or share a bed, or even a flat, I will understand and I will still be your best friend.” 

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

Adam smiled and kissed him softly. Justin released his hand and instead wrapped his arm around Adam’s shoulder, who happily tucked himself against Justin’s side. 

“Can I ask what brought this all on?” 

Adam sighed but answered. “It’s our anniversary. Six months. And it just got me thinking and then I got all anxious and couldn’t sleep and… well, you saw where I landed.”

“Is it really? I feel like a bad boyfriend, I had no idea,” he said with a self-deprecating laugh. 

Adam nodded into his chest. “We don’t have to do anything, I just want to be with you. But then I got worried.”

“Worried happens, B. I’m glad you told me. Anything I can do?”

“This is nice.”

Justin squeezed him and dropped another kiss on his hair. 

“I like when you do that,” Adam murmured. 

“This?” Justin kissed his hair again. 

“Yeah,” Adam sighed. “Even if it makes me blush.”

Justin shifted them on the bench and kissed Adam’s hair again, then his ear, his cheek, his nose, and finally his lips. Adam’s face was bright pink. 

“I like making you blush,” he whispered. Adam blushed deeper. 

“Take me home?” Adam whispered back. 

“Gladly.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do plan to write more of this verse, we've gotta see zimbits apparating to france and avoiding paparazi? charmer flirting through quidditch? shitty and lardo dating-not-dating for several years? I WANT TO WRITE THEM ALL  
> anyways, thank you for reading! i'm on tumblr at [willdexpoindexter](https://willdexpoindexter.tumblr.com/) , come shout about these hockey-turned-quidditch boys


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